1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a disk loading apparatus. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus and method of selectively loading disks of different sizes.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a disk drive records and reproduces information in and from a disk-shaped medium such as CD, digital video disk (DVD), DVD-ROM or the like. The disk drive includes a loading apparatus for loading the disk into a certain position at which information is recorded and reproduced in and from the disk. After the disk is injected into a body of the disk player by means of the loading apparatus, the disk is positioned on a turntable, and is then clamped by a chucking unit to be ready for rotating. During rotation of the disk on the turntable, an optical pickup moves in a radial direction of the disk to record the information in the disk or reproduce the information from the disk.
In particular, due to miniaturization and spatial limitations of the disk player, a disk loading apparatus is recently employed to directly load the disk without a disk tray. In addition, another disk loading apparatus capable of loading disks of different sizes, such as 80 mm or 120 mm, is utilized.
FIG. 1 is a schematic view depicting a conventional disk loading mechanism for a disk drive.
In FIG. 1, the disk loading mechanism includes a locking lever 12, a first guide lever 13, a second guide lever 14, a pushing lever 15, a sliding member 16 (FIG. 6), first and second interlocking levers 17 and 18, and a slider 20.
The locking lever 12 selectively locks the first guide lever 13, and the first and second guide levers 13 and 14 guide a disk 1 or 2 (FIG. 8) to be loaded into a chucking position. The pushing lever 15 is pushed by the disk 1 of 120 mm to push the slider 20. The pushing lever 15 pushes the slider 20 in cooperation with the first and second interlocking levers 17 and 18 interlocked with the second guide lever 14 upon the loading of the disk 2 of 80 mm (FIG. 8). The slider 20 pushed by the pushing lever 15 is coupled to the motor 3, and is thus continuously moved. The sliding member 16 (FIG. 6) is moved to the right in cooperation with the moving slider 20 to unlock the first guide lever 13, and is interlocked with the second guide lever 14 to release the guide pins 13a and 14a provided at the first and second guide levers 13 and 14.
A process of loading the disk 1 of 120 mm will now be described with reference to FIG. 1.
The disk 1 of 120 mm is injected in a front direction A of the disk player. The injected disk 1 abuts against a transferring roller 11 installed to an inside of the main chassis 10. At that time, it is determined by a sensor (not illustrated) whether the disk is injected or not, and the motor 3 is driven by a signal from the sensor to rotate the transferring roller 11. The disk 1 is injected into the main chassis 10, as illustrated in FIG. 2, and comes into contact with the pin 12a of the locking lever 12 to push out the pin 12a. The rotation of the locking lever 12 causes the locking boss 12b to be released from the first locking groove 13b of the first guide lever 13.
As illustrated in FIG. 3, as the disk 1 is injected, the disk comes into contact with the guide pin 13a of the first guide lever 13 and the guide pin 14a of the second guide lever 14 to push out the pins 13a and 14a. Each of the levers 13 and 14 is pushed by the disk 1 completely injected into the chucking position, and is rotated in an opposite direction to each other. As illustrated in FIG. 4, the locking boss 12b of the locking lever 12 is locked into a second locking groove 13c of the first guide lever 13 to fix the first guide lever 13. The second guide lever 14 is also fixed in cooperation with the first guide lever 13. The disk 1, when moved into the chucking position, pushes and rotates the left end 15a of the pushing lever 15. The right end 15b of the pushing lever 15 pushes the slider 20 in the direction B.
FIG. 5 is a right view of FIG. 4. In FIG. 5, when the slider 20 is moved in the direction B, the idling drive gear 4 meshes with the rack gear 21. Therefore, the slider 20 is continuously moved in the direction B in cooperation with the drive gear 4 and the rack gear 21.
As illustrated in FIG. 6, a guide pin 23 of the slider 20 moving in the direction B is moved along a cam groove 16a of a sliding member 16 to operate the sliding member 16 in a right side thereof. While the sliding member 16 is moved in the right side, a desired shape of a flange 16b contacts and pushes a guide pin 12c provided at a right end of a locking lever 12 to release a locking boss 12b from a second locking groove 13c. A guide pin 14b of a second guide lever 14 is guided along a cam groove 16c of the sliding member 16. As the first and second guide levers 13 and 14 are further rotated by the cooperation with each other, the guide pins 13a and 14a are spaced apart from the disk 1. The pushing lever 15 is pushed by the slider 20, which is spaced apart from the disk 1.
FIG. 7 is a right view of FIG. 6. In FIG. 7, while the slider 20 is moving, the chucking lever 30 is moved down along the cam groove 25 of the slider 20 to chuck the disk 1, so that the disk is seated on the turntable.
A process of unloading the disk 1 is implemented in a reverse order of the loading process.
A process of loading a disk 2 of 80 mm will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. In FIG. 8, a disk 2 is injected into the main chassis 10 in the direction A. Similar to the operation of disk 1, the injection of the disk 2 is detected by a sensor, and the motor 3 is driven by a signal from the sensor to rotate the transferring roller 11. Therefore, the disk 1 is injected into the main chassis 10. The disk 2 is transferred into the chucking position, as illustrated in FIG. 9, to push out the first guide pin 17a provided at the first interlocking lever 17.
As illustrated in FIG. 10, if the guide pin 17a is pushed by the disk 2, the first interlocking lever 17 is rotated in a direction C around the guide pin 14a, and a second interlocking lever 18 is rotated in a direction D by a second pin 17b. A pin 15c of the pushing lever 15 is pulled by the second interlocking lever 18, such that the slider 20 is pushed in the direction B at a certain distance. As such, the slider 20 is moved in the direction B by the drive gear 4, as the state illustrated in FIG. 5. The sliding member 16 is moved to the right side in cooperation with the guide pin 23 of the slider 20, as illustrated in FIG. 11. The guide pin 12c of the locking lever 12 is rotated by the sliding member 16, so that the locking boss 12b is released from the first locking groove 13b. The guide pin 14c of the first guide lever 14 is guided along the cam groove 16c of the sliding member 16 in a certain distance, so that the first and second guide levers 13 and 14 are rotated relative to each other at a certain angle. As such, each of the guide pins 13a and 14a is spaced apart from the disk 2. The chucking lever 30 is moved down, as illustrated in FIG. 7, to chuck the disk to be rotated on the turntable.
In the case of a conventional disk loading apparatus configured as described above, it consists of the first interlocking lever 17, the second interlocking lever 18 and the pushing lever 15 to cause the slider 20 to be cooperatively operated to release each guide pins 13a and 14a from the disk 1 or 2 loaded into the chucking position. This construction requires many components. In particular, since it is required for many interlocking members to cooperatively operate the slider 20, there are some problems of increased power consumption and possibility of malfunction. In addition, the sliding member 16 is utilized to release each guide pins 13a and 14a from the first and second disk 1 or 2, but the sliding member 16 is large and inefficiently transfers the power.